Palimpsest

Saturday 25 April 2015

Archimedes Palimpsest

Archimedes Palimpsest was found in a rare 10th-century Byzantine Greek
manuscript, which is a palimpsest because it is a manuscript in which
pages have been written on twice. As writing material was expensive
an original text could be washed off so the parchment could be reused.
The upper layer of writing on the document to be auctioned contains
instructions for religious rites but underneath it contains versions
of Archimedes' most celebrated Greek texts. In the Middle Ages,
the work was owned by a monastery in Palestine whose collection
was incorporated into the Greek Patriarchate library in Jerusalem
in the 19th century. It was later transferred to a monastery in Istanbul.
The work was taken to Athens when the monastery's library
was broken up after World War I.
source

http://www.archimedespalimpsest.org/

Archimedes Palimpsest - more
more
more + contemporary palimpsests

Tuesday 7 May 2013

Roy Jackson

'To Fleur Ramon', oil on board, 56 x 76cm

'To Fleur Ramon' is a recent painting (which looks like a drawing) by Sydney

artist Roy Jackson. His work alludes to the palimpsest very directly. By covering the canvas/paper with scrawled letter-forms he alludes to writing but it turns out he has nothing verbal to communicate. There are no words as such, just lines and forms. The tones, developed to fullness through the putting down and scraping away of black and white paint, are atmospheric and perhaps suggest an oncoming storm in the landscape or the mind. (Joe Frost)

Monday 6 May 2013

Palimpsests + buildings

Architects imply palimpsest as a ghost — an image of what once was.source

source

Gabriel Orozco

Gabriel Orozco Black Kites 1997

Gabriel Orozco Atomists: Making Strides, 1996. Computer generated print.

from Eva Koťátková, Theatre of Speaking Objects, 2012, Sydney Biennale 2012

Emma Hamilton

Emma Hamilton Salt Flat 2013

Artist statement:
Engaging with ideas of suspension and doubling, the project Salt Flat by Emma Hamilton explores the pink lakes of the Mallee region of Victoria. In this arid environment the lakes occasionally become a series of vast dry lakebeds blanketed in a dense layer of salt. Salt Flat examines a landscape in stasis, seeking to understand this mass of water preserved as a cast form. This project forms part of the artist’s ongoing investigation into white landscapes. source

Elizabeth Eastland

Elizabeth Eastland Lost Drawing (Pythagoras’ Proof) 2009 chalk on painted board

Ana Mendieta

Ana Mendieta, from her "Silueta" series (1976)

Doris Salcedo

DORIS SALCEDO

Untitled

WOOD, METAL AND CONCRETE

39 3/8 x 16 1/2 x 18 1/2 in.

Rivoli Castle Museum of Contemporary Art

Christo and Jean-Claude

Christo
"Fauteuil empaquetee" (Projet pour Spectrum - Bergeyk) Salle 3, Stedelijk Vanabbe Museum - Eindhoven, Hollande
Collage 1965-66
28 x 22" (71 x 56 cm)
Pencil, charcoal, wax crayon, cardboard, polyethylene and rope
Photo: Archive
© 1966 Christo

source

http://www.christojeanneclaude.net/

Christopher Fortescue

Christopher Fortescue Naturalism #2 2008 (see more)

Chris Fortescue, Untitled wall drawing using wall-paper cut outs,1991

Linden Gallery, Melbourne. (see more)

Cathy Blanchflower

source

Brice Marden

Brice Marden 2010 (source)

Listen to Brice Marden talk about his process

Alex Rizkalla

Alex Rizkalla Flight 1995

Several old slide projectors on time-board

project Muybridge images of birds in different stages of flight,

over white waistcoats pinned to the wall in a regular pattern.

The movement of the slide projectors emitted a sound like birds wings

close to the ears of visitors.

Ah Xian

Ah Xian China Bust 72 2002

Ah Xian was born in Beijing in 1960. Initially trained as a painter, Ah Xian was a practising artist in China throughout the 1980s. Following the events in Tiananmen Square in 1989, he sought political asylum in Australia and moved to Sydney in 1990. Since the 1990s, Ah Xian has united traditional Chinese materials and techniques with a contemporary sculptural practice to address issues surrounding cultural displacement, identity politics and the relationship between East and West. His recent works continue to explore the material and symbolic possibilities of techniques such as lacquer-ware, bronze and cloisonné to represent the human form. In 1999 Ah Xian was included in the Third Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art at the Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane. Major solo exhibitions include China, China – Recent Porcelain Works of Ah Xian, Beijing Teachers University, Beijing, and Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, 2000; and Ah Xian Meets Jingdezhen, Museum of Frankfurt, Germany, 2002. Ah Xian lives in Sydney. source